What did mankind do without the invention of dental services? Did our naked ancestors stroll around the plains looking for handy herbs with which to scrub their teeth? Did someone chomp on a piece of mint and voila mouthwash was born?

Yesterday I had two fillings replaced. Part of me thinks this is a racket, like every dentist's desire to removal all wisdom teeth, and straighten every tooth in your mouth. Even as an adult, every time I go to a new dentist, they all try to upsell me on braces. Braces are a form of extreme discipline and reduce any likelihood of having a normal teenage-hood to somewhere between nil and zero. Coupled with pink glasses, long stringy hair, and clothes acquired from wherever...

You get the point: I'm never getting braces again. I'd like veneers, though. The BallChicks at the Braves game all had them, and I thought they looked nice. Those and the fake racks.

As usual, the office is running late. It's a weird office - a de-converted Macaroni Grill (or something italian-ish like that) - run by weird people but almost entirely female, which is a change.

First, the impressions for the mouthguard. I am a jaw clencher and a teeth grinder of a the first order, so this is a necessity, although an expensive one. The first mould was too big to even fit in my mouth, and my little dental hygenist (from Bulgaria, I asked, and not so little) had to go get the children's plate for little ole moi! That shit is gross, let me tell ya, and you have to have three impressions made to make sure it's right.

As they are gassing me up, and giving me the numbing gel, the dentist strolls in, pops the mask off my face and says "Girl, are you high yet?" and starts laughing like a madwoman. So does the hygenist from Bulgaria, who starts in on crazy patients on gas stories, like the woman who hallucinated a bear, or the patient who passed out in the chair, and then we went into office gossip, and patient gossip, and I was rather entertained as I had two fillings drilled out and replaced (the smell, oh my god, the smell of your teeth being drilled out of your head is really rather revolting. When did my nose get so sensitive?)

Leaving the office is not such a good experience. I look like Billy Idol - I'm afraid I'm going to drool, so I have this perpetual sneer. Driving back to the office to pick up Mr. Manners, the whole world has gone plumb crazy and tilted the wrong way on it's axis because people are LINING UP TO GET GAS like complete idiots. And it's messing up my driving pattern, people, so get the hell out of the way. And yes, there is only one gas station on the whole of Mansell Road with gas, and it's the Racetrac, the one that you can't get into from the main road...yeah, the one with shitty frontage.

The whole no gas thing still entertains me. Why is there no gas? Because people are idiots. Do folks really think that the oil you put in your car comes only from Texas?

Oh yeah, right....I forget I live in a country where some of the top selling publications are USA Today and Time Magazine (NewsForThirdGraders, and NewsForDummies, respectively).